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Why not just say 'workers and bees come from the same sort of cell'? We knew that. You're dressing up the language to make simple things sound technical. Its as if you're trying to blind us with science?

Originally Posted by JWChesnut

Every single bee is non-identical to any other nest-mate. This is because "crossing-over" occurs early in the process meiosis (ie gamete-egg-sperm production). Recombination during meiosis is important to recognize -- workers and drones both are each and everyone a distinct individual genotype.

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

Originally Posted by JWChesnut

Just went through an interesting exchange on my local bee club regarding the scene in the documentary More than Honey about the commercial California uncapping scene. In case you haven't seen the doc, it is filmed as agit-prop emphasizing the disruption and chaos as millions of bees are blown out of hives on a mechanical conveyor belt. The scene is made deliberately provocative -- "bee's torn from their home, oh the inhumanity of it all".

I counter that "blown" bees are likely an extremely effective way of creating a full brood break onto new and sterilized comb. The practice resets the disease clock completely -- not just varroa, but all the other comb based diseases. It is a really effective "chemical-free" process.

Its done here (more gently - at least as I've seen it) as 'artificial swarming'.

Like all treatments is preserves all those that would in nature perish, thus ridding the population of its least adapted individuals and their dysfunctional genes. Just as effective in setting back the resistance clock to zero.

Chemical free it might be. A solution to the problem lack of natural resistance it ain't. 'Treatment free'? Not in my book.

Mike (UK)

The race isn't always to the swift, nor the fight to the strong, but that's the way to bet

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

I think that some hives do seem to outbreed the mites for a good while. but when winter comes the scales tip.

Have you tried looking for VSH? Recapped cells? perhaps you can get a tighter focus somehow.

From here, my first assumption would be that the ferals you have been getting haven't made much, if any, progress toward resistance - likely they are simply first or second year escapees. Can you try harder to locate some thriving resistant ferals?

Originally Posted by gmcharlie

As for drones, not much to say, With queens not showing me anything (FYI that also includes a lot of Ferals) I havent spent a lot of effort on drones. add that to a large number of feral hives and there is not much point in drone control. I do only use the strongest hives near the queen yard.

Tell us more about these ferals. How is it do you think that bees can survive in the wild near you but not in your yard? What is making the difference?

Mike (UK)

The race isn't always to the swift, nor the fight to the strong, but that's the way to bet

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

Originally Posted by squarepeg

aw come on mike, if there's one thing that's consistent it's how inconsistent drawing the line is amongst beekeepers.

Among beekeepers, sure! I meant among scientists, evolutionary biologists, competent breeders, competent husbandrymen. The line is: put best to best. Don't allow second or third best to contribute to the breeding pool, and never ever keep a sick animal alive and allow its genes into the breeding pool.

Sure, I know not all beekeepers follow this! I wouldn't need to be here making these arguments again and again if they did!

Originally Posted by squarepeg

we beekeepers are actually given a lot of latitude when it comes to where we drawn the line in terms of husbandry and this highly arbitrary and variable expression of the privilege to do so defines beekeeping.

For you maybe - and many others. Personally I make a kind of distinction along the lines of 'beekeepers' and bee-users'. The 'privilege' allowing the latter to screw up bees to the detriment of the future of the species, natural ecology, unborn human generations and other beekeepers is one I'd withdraw if I had the power to do so.

You have the sort of 'variable expression of the privilege to do so' given to fishermen without regulation. Pretty soon there are no fish and no fishermen, and humanity and unborn generations have lost something precious that wasn't fishermen's to take.

Originally Posted by squarepeg

it appears that you and i have a different point of view, and both of them are 'arbitrary', are they not?

Mine isn't. Its founded on a science-based deeply considered understanding of the mechanisms by which modern beekeeping perpetuates its primary problem.

Mike (UK)

Last edited by mike bispham; 01-06-2014 at 04:34 AM.

The race isn't always to the swift, nor the fight to the strong, but that's the way to bet

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

Originally Posted by Saltybee
The idea that man is only providing a box for the all natural bee is like believing man can raise the all natural maize by throwing corn into a field.

Originally Posted by Delta Bay

Or that man is the master of natural selection.

I don't think arguing the semantics of nature is going help much. The point is this:

In an open mating organism, the more you keep sickly individuals alive to mate, the more sickness there will be in the next generation.

That is just simply inarguable. Like day follows night.

Husbandrymen should be mindful of this, particularly when suffering from a seemingly intractable sickness.

They can be aided in their understanding by consideration of Nature's ways. For your contemplation, some words from one of the most famous bee breeders of all time (My emphasies):

""Breeding is, in the first place, simply the increase in the number of queens."

"Yet breeding is not merely a question of reproduction. Above all, breeding implies improvement in the bee's performance capability "

"Queen breeding ranks as the most important activity in the efficient management of an apiary: by it, the apiarist [...] advances from being a Beekeeper to a being a Beebreeder."

"Breeding is by no means a human invention. Nature, which in millions of years
has bought forth this immense diversity of wonderfully adapted creatures, is the
greatest breeder. It is from her that the present day breeder learnt how it must
be done, excessive production and then ruthless selection, permitting only the
most suitable to survive and eliminating the inferior."

Friedrich Ruttner,
Breeding Techniques and Selection for Breeding of the Honeybee, pg 45

These principles are extremes of the methods undertaken by ordinary, competent, beekeepers - those Ruttner speaks of in the third extract above, which I've highlighted.

If you are genuinely interested in tf beekeeping, you'll need to become very familiar with these things. And if and when you are, you'll understand that protecting your bees from passing diseases simply - and dramatically - increases the liklihood that future generations will suffer from them. You've interfered with the population's primary health mechanism; and you - and others - pay the price.

Life is tough. But the way to get through isn't to wrap your hives in cotton wool. Its to equip your stock to meet the challenges.

Mike (UK)

Last edited by mike bispham; 01-06-2014 at 04:37 AM.

The race isn't always to the swift, nor the fight to the strong, but that's the way to bet

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

This is another approach towards natural selection.

Quote.
We explored practical steps to implement a sustainable treatment against Varroa destructor which is adapted to common beekeeping situations, and applies conventional control but nevertheless exerts selection pressure towards increased mite tolerance in honey bees. This approach approximates conditions of natural selection in host-parasite systems, and is supported by evidence that the impact of V. destructor decreases when bee populations are overexploited by the parasites.

"In summary, this work shows rather definitively that gut microbiotia is heritable (and very old), and that a line damaged by antibiotics does not return (at least in 25+ years) to its original population."

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

Originally Posted by Oldtimer

you cannot recognise recapped cells just by looking at the cap.

Not so sure about this. When I first went to SC and was "regressing" all my bees, I would notice cells that had been opened with partially chewed larva as well as untouched larva still alive. The same area had capped cells scattered around that were higher than the others. Worker brood, not drone. Discussing this with Ed and Dee, they felt these were recapped cells. I took photos. Will see if I can find them.

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

If this is so then how do you explain that an entire population of untreated bees became sickly?

It was a new, introduced, parasite. The inbuilt defenses against it (and its kind) were very low in the population, as they hadn't been needed (and entail costs).

Originally Posted by Daniel Y

What if nature sees the bees as the pestilence and is in the process of eliminating it?

Nature doesn't 'see' anything. 'Nature' is what is, and what happens, without human interference. What you suggest isn't happening: bees are naturally raising their defences where they are able to - that is where people aren't treating and preventing that happening. Its happened to bees a million times before. It happens to all natural populations on a fairly regular basis. New predator, population crash t the few resistant, rebuild from the resistant (only). There's ample evidence to demonstrate that happening all over the world. Except in apiaries.

Mike (UK)

The race isn't always to the swift, nor the fight to the strong, but that's the way to bet

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

Originally Posted by Michael Bush

"In summary, this work shows rather definitively that gut microbiotia is heritable (and very old), and that a line damaged by antibiotics does not return (at least in 25+ years) to its original population."

If this is remotely accurate then we are all doomed to bees with terrible IBS ... It also appears that the solution is simple NZ bees would be more resistant to pathogens carried by Varroa.

Mike, most of the feral hives here are young hives. swarming seems to keep them going. This year is probably going to be the lowest in a long time for ferals. a really bad year for honey last year, and a sever winter will make wild losses very high.
Still looking for that link for the "restiant" producers....

Honey bees (Apis mellifera L.) bred for Varroa sensitive hygiene (VSH) selectively remove pupae infested with Varroa destructor Anderson & Trueman (Mesostigmata: Varroidae) from capped brood that is inserted into the nest. After 1 wk, remaining brood cells tend to have been uncapped and recapped, and remaining mites are mostly infertile. A primary goal of this experiment was to compare the reproductive status of mites that remained in recapped and normally capped cells after a 1-wk exposure to VSH and control colonies. Differences in distribution of fertile mites in normally capped brood cells between VSH bees and control bees may suggest that the stimulus for hygiene is related to reproduction by mites. Identification of stimuli triggering VSH behavior could be used to develop new bioassays for selective breeding of this important resistance mechanism. Combs of capped brood that were exposed to control bees had 10 times more pupae with fertile mites in normally capped brood as did VSH bees (6.7 and 0.7%, respectively). They also had 3 times more pupae with infertile mites in normally capped brood than did VSH bees (1.4 and 0.5%, respectively). Thus, VSH bees targeted fertile mites by a 3:1 ratio by either removing or uncapping and recapping their host pupae. Biased removal of mite-infested pupae with fertile mites suggested that stimuli triggering VSH behavior were enhanced by the presence of mite offspring within the brood cell. This bias for fertile mites is not seen during experiments of short 3-h duration. The differing results are discussed relative to a behavioral threshold model for hygienic behavior in honey bees in which different experimental protocols may reflect activities of honey bees having different sensitivities to pupae infested by fertile mites. In addition, mortality of mite offspring was significantly higher in recapped cells than in normally capped cells and contributed to decreased reproduction by the mites.

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

On Bee.L.
With regard to the question as to whether VSH bees will recap bald brood, I
asked one of the researchers who are investigating the phenomenon
intimately--Dr. Jeffrey Harris at the Baton Rouge Lab. His reply:

Hello Randy,

Yes. We have seen all pupal stages into lightly tanned body get recapped by
VSH bees. Purple-eyed pupae with white bodies are commonly recapped.

Re: Something needs to change - looking for suggestions

You may have a point that beneficial flora in the bee gut is a good thing. But what does it mean? with bees being so social, and drifters common, I would expect that any hive even if treated would soon have replenished the beneficial bacteria's.
Secondly were it such a huge issue, we could and would see dramatic results. As pointed out NZ bees (and other places) would be extremely healthy, and bees treated with things to eliminate EFB would be dieing off in record numbers.
This is not what we are seeing. not even close. In fact no trends seem to be popping out, specifically ones that show old hives outliving all others. or swarms from older hives solving all the problems. were that the case a few drifters with nectar could and would quickly replace the missing flora in our domestic hives.
If gut fauna were the answers then I would suspect feral hives to long outlive packages brought in. Not what I am seeing. Data shows its a time factor. how many mite cycles.... a hot potato if you will. constant splitting and brood breaks seem to relieve the symptoms...

I do understand in your area you seem to have something else working well for you. How may of your hives are going 2-3 years without brood breaks or requeening??